"The question should be whether killing these things improves or diminishes our survival. If their removal gives us freedom to purge the stench from this place, great! If not, we may be exterminating a potential ally we could use later."

OOC: Dmitri doesn't expect this to persuade anyone, but he feels the need to put the thought out there. I have no objections to whatever the group does in this matter.

Emily agrees with Dmitri but she speaks in monosyllables as she watches carefully over Jerzy.

"They're malevolent, they intend us harm, and there's some kind of essence-entity within them that can cause them to twitch at early stages. I'm not interested in waiting until they're a bigger threat before dealing with them. "

Steeling himself against what he's about to subject himself to, Arjun activates Magic Sight once more, and examines the chunk of ground, the hole it was cut out of, and then their surroundings one more time.

Then he suggests the party either kills the plum or moves on.

"I would have said move on", said Emily, "But if you have some evidence of malevolence rather than rattish neophobia, my mind can of course be changed."

As the group considers what the intent of these various entities could be, and bemoans how alien and disgusting they are, Jerzy in particular is still trying to grab the attention of a god that may or may not exist... this has not gone well before...

As Arjun switches his tired magic sight back on, likely realizing that he has indeed been heavily relying on this skill for information, a pang of a headache immediately hits him... he manages to push it back though, but soon turns off the skill as he finds what he wanted to see.

The ground had no pair of essences, but he COULD see five sources of pairs of essences, distinctive of these plums, beyond the hill, spread around a bit farther in.

Secondly, beyond the hill he could sense ANOTHER pair of black and purple energy... but this one is more intense than the plums, and is in the position of the creature Dmitri had briefly communicated with.

Vaguely and hazily, he can actually see two more sources of that same stronger version of essence, but they are together near the furthest edge of the disc, nearing the maximum range of this skill at the time.

---

Meanwhile, Jerzy finishes his ill-advised potential summoning of a new Observer... and with this...


There is no shaking of the world, and there is no panicked messages from the Observers or Administration. Instead, the {SYSTEM} itself solves everything cleanly.

Meanwhile, Jerzy receives a message.

Emily smiles, "And it seems that Jerzy has received answers from a divine source.  We are all ears, Jerzy. What did the God of Ultimate Truth say?"

Jerzy replies to emily, "It asks a simple inquiry, what do i have to offer."

Turning back to the sky, Jerzy offers, "If you are omniscient in this...place, I can offer only knowedge I bring with me from before. However if you are as much of a stranger here as I am, I can share all that I learn of this fascinating place. If both worlds are well known to you, then the only novel information I can provide is my own perspective on this experience.

In return, I ask for information to keep my and my fellow humans alive here. Most urgently what are the other living beings on this island and are they a threat?" Jerzy is ready to share any knowledge of the old world and the new.

"If it helps, you can offer an instant disciple. Although my normal attitude toward interfering entities is one of generalized indifference, this particular deity is one that I can get behind. I was looking for a deity of wisdom, but this is a reasonable facsimile of that."

Emily blinks and looks from Jerzy to Dmitri and back to Jerzy.  "I would have thought 'Ultimate Truth' was if anything, almost the antithesis of wisdom."

"I would beg to differ. Wisdom is knowing what to do with knowledge, which is impossible without knowledge to apply."

Otto had made plain his discomfort in invoking these "Deities", but he stayed silent in the matter. He rolled his neck back and forth, causing a few muffled pops, and seemed to consider the terrain.

"Looks like we would need to dig...or cut our way down." He mused quietly, mostly to Arjun.

Everyone is quiet in waiting as Jerzy gets a quick, but quite long response.

Well, a 'god' would be able to compose a message rather quickly, huh?
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:25, Sun 20 Mar 2022.

Arjun quietly points out the various sources of magical emanations he had located, and then attempts to sneak a sight of the closest of the five nearby.

"This is agreeable, provided I can save the 4 reveals for a later date.

We can proceeed, though the experience with the purple objects may be a little...unpleasant."

Turning to the group, Jerzy says, "heads up, this diety will be giving me telepathic information on this monster, and future monster. Though they did so with a disclaimer that they are not liable for injury. So...I might be taking one for the team here."

"And to be specific, this is the god of knowledge."

"About as specific as anything around here. Say, Mr. God of Knowledge, do you have any knowledge about how to assign names to things that don't have them? Because I don't like addressing entities by title as it sounds too unattached, especially if we're supposed to be putting investiture in them. Just saying."

"Well, there you go" Otto nodded and hefted his club when Jerry more or less gave them the green light to go monster hunting. "What'cha thinkin' Shadow Man? Can you make a weapon that can hack through a few feet of this...stuff?" he asked Arjun as he raised one eyebrow slightly.

Arjun gets on his tip toes to catch a peak at the closest fruit, but it's still blocked by the hill. The farther ones are actually angled in such a way that he could see them, but their distance also is a factor.

In the first place, the plums are hard to notice since the biggest tell would be a lump in the ground... and well, this whole place is a little lumpy.

And now, as he looks at it again, Arjun realizes the far end of this disc leads into a bit of a valley, where the two nonplum sources must be hidden from him!

Basically, in this position nobody can see much of anything.

---

Meanwhile, both Jerzy and Dmitri receive a message.

---

Meanwhile, the barbarian just wants to hit stuff
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:34, Sun 20 Mar 2022.

It is evident from what his last girlfriend called his "eye flash" that Dmitri has many things he wishes to say to this new Guest Observer, but he does not wish to express them to the group if he doesn't have to. To that end, he tries to set up a Telepathic Bond with the Observer, or at least open his mind up to the entity so that it can read his thoughts.

Dmitri tries to use his telepathic bond on the observer, but the skill does not activate. This makes sense, as it needs a target, and simply imagining whatever 'source' is behind the messages he is receiving is clearly far, far from viable.

Thus, he simply opts to think it out in his mind instead of saying anything. He also personally tries to direct the thoughts or maybe just leave them open for viewing, which is a bit weird to do but maybe it will have some effect.

Anyway, another alert appears before him as he finishes.



After a few moments of Dmitri reading a screen in front of him, everyone except him sees a new alert appear before them.

"Quest accepted", whispers Emily, "music carries information for those who can listen.".

With that she begins playing her banjo, running through an arpeggio including all twelve notes in an octave, then in the octave above, making a grand total of twenty-four notes. She then begins composing a tune that goes, c#, then up an octave to b-flat in the next octave up, up to f#, continuing to play with a simple code hidden in the music. . "But of course with spaces and chords and changes of rhythm, music can carry  yet more important and complex information." she demonstrates.

Emily whispers some cryptic stuff in a hushed voice that everyone else can pick up on due to the short distance, and then plays a fairly simple tune, which isn't particularly anything.

PM to the God of Knowledge
This message was last edited by the player at 11:40, Sun 20 Mar 2022.

"Quest accepted, deal accepted. Will transfer both sets of infromation via telepathic link"

"Finally, a quest! Very well, quest accepted." Dmitri then fires a lengthy thought at this God of Knowledge.